Working Title: A Twist In My Story
by i-lovedyoufirst
Summary: Okay, I suck at summaries. Bella's in a coma after her cliff-diving "adventure," Jake's her protector, Edward comes back, there's tension and angst and everything fun. Check it out.
1. Chapter 1

**AN: So, here's another story I wrote for the SUPER AWESOME CAUSE, SupportStacie. I highly recommend that you go check it out at supportstacie . com.**

**As far as I can tell, it's going to have four parts, although I'm really in _love_ with writing it, so it could possibly be five. This is also just my working title, and if you come up with any ideas while you're reading, definitely let me know. Comments are appreciated. I'd love to know what you think!**

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"Don't you dare die on me!"

Bella didn't move.

"Bella! Isabella Swan, don't you dare die! Wake up! Wake _up!_"

Still no movement.

It had been four weeks. Twenty eight days. 672 hours. 40,320 minutes. It had been _one entire month_ since Bella's first cliff dive, and her last. One month since she had hit her head just a little too hard, since Jake had gotten there just a little too late. One month since she'd slipped into a coma.

Each ticking second had drilled itself deeper into Jacob's brain. Not just his mind, but his very _brain. _It had been one entire month, and Bella hadn't moved an inch. Neither had she been alone, though. Not for one single ticking, maddening, haunting second. It was April, and despite several of them still being in school, Jake had arranged for a La Push boy always on patrol. This was partly to protect her machine-enabled body from the ravages of Victoria, but it was _mostly_ for Jacob.

It was for Jacob, whose worry haunted his thoughts during the hours spent on his extended runs during the hours he should have been resting. It was for Jacob, who sat by her side and held her hand and whispered encouragement more continuously and persistently than any of them. It was for Jacob, who couldn't help but blame himself.

Finally, after a month, it had gotten to him.

"Wake up, I said! Did you hear me? I'm _sick_ of this, Bells, get up! Get up!" Charlie started awake at the sound of the shouting, rubbing his face and springing to his feet as a nurse came running in.

"Mr. Black, please, you must be quiet! I can't have screaming like this in my ward! Mr. Swan, _do_ something about him, please!" Charlie nodded and took Jacob by the shoulders. His yells had faded into hoarse sobs, and the nurse turned to go, but shot Charlie with a look that left him no option but to keep Jacob quiet. He nodded as she left.

"Jacob," he began awkwardly as Jacob's dry sobs continued. Charlie wrapped his arms uncomfortably around the big boy for a moment, patting him inconsequently. "Jacob," he began again after no more than ten seconds, "go home."

Jacob shook his head vehemently and unkempt, dirty hair flew in all directions. "No, Charlie. I'm here til six, then Quil. You know that." It was three o'clock.

"Jacob," Charlie said, "_go home._ I've let you and the boys keep this crazy schedule because strings were able to be pulled, and you just made it seem so damn important." Running a hand over his scruffy face, he admitted, "I'm not ashamed to say it made me feel…well, safer, having you guys here when I couldn't be. But enough's enough. Go home, sleep a solid eight hours—although I'd recommend something more like a solid eighteen—and _then_ you can come back and see her. Quil can still come at six if you want, but you're going home _now._ I think I'm plenty capable of watching over my own daughter for three hours by myself."

"But Charlie—"

"No 'but Charlie.' Go."

Jacob knew there was no fighting him—not that he would have had the energy to, anyway. Hanging his head in defeat, he walked slowly to the bed and kissed the cool cheek of his Bella. "See you later, honey," he whispered, and flapped a tired hand at Charlie as he left the room. He ran as a wolf once he reached the woods, and had just barely made it home when he began to phase back out of pure exhaustion. He dropped into his bed without ceremony, without a word to his father, and, amazingly, without another thought of Bella.

The hospital was void of werewolves then, for the first time in 40,320 minutes. 672 hours. Twenty eight days.

Edward Cullen was there by morning.


	2. Chapter 2

Jacob knew the moment he phased the next morning. He knew as he jumped out of bed with a start, embarrassed at having slept through the night. He knew so instantaneously that it was as though he had known all along, and the rage soared through him as though it had been waiting.

_Cullen. _Just the one word entered his mind as he swiftly shed his human form. He felt his hackles rising, defense mechanisms preparing themselves. He did not listen for more, or even inquire as to which wolf had been kind enough to inform him of the bloodsucker's arrival. Instead, he attempted to close his mind the way he'd been practicing, and ran.

When he phased back in the clearing behind the hospital, changing quickly into the clothes he kept there, he was shaking. It had nothing to do with the transformation, or the distance he had just run in record time; it was fury, pure and simple.

He slammed his way into the hospital and very nearly ran straight into Embry, who was wating just inside the automatic doors. "He got here yesterday, maybe at nine o'clock or so. Sam was on watch and Paul was out stalking the redhead and he just _showed up,_ you know, like he had every right to be here or something. He walked right up to her room like, he must have figured out where it was, and Charlie, Charlie got _so_ pissed, he wouldn't let him in, told him visiting hours were 'most definitely over,' and that he could just march his ass out to the waiting room and wait for morning."

The words came out quickly, tumbling over one another as if Embry was trying to make sure he could get everything out before Jacob could _really_ start to freak. He took a deep breath, preparing himself to say more, but Jacob cut him off at the pass. "What time is it?"

"Nine," Embry said, face falling. His fifteen minutes of news-bearing fame had ended before it even really had a chance to begin. "You slept all night."

"Damn it," Jacob muttered, bypassing the elevator and taking the stairs two, and then three, at a time. "Damn it, damn it, _damn it_!" Embry hurried along behind him, trying uselessly to calm Jacob down.

"He's only in the waiting room, Jake. Don't worry. He hasn't seen her. He hasn't."

"Cullen." Jacob slammed open the door at the top of the stairs and moved quickly, extraordinarily quickly, to where the sullen vampire sat waiting. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I came to see her, Jacob," Edward said evenly, meeting his fierce gaze.

"She's been here for a _month. _If you were really interested in seeing her, why'd you wait so long?" At this, Edward cast his eyes toward the few other occupants of the waiting room, most of whom were not bothering to hide their stares.

"This is something we should discuss a little more privately, Jacob."

"I don't think so."

"I do." Edward stood slowly, and made his way with steady steps toward Jacob who, in demeanor, seemed at the moment to be more wolf than boy. "If you'll just come outside with me, I'll explain—"

_"You don't deserve to be here!" _Jacob roared, losing control for the second time in two days. Even lying prostrate in a hospital bed, lacking the ability to even _breathe_ on her own, she had the power to make him lose control, to make him act like a fool. Even half dead, Bella had complete control over him, and he hated her for that.

"Jacob, please just—"

"No! I'm not playing with you, Cullen. I want you out of here."

"And I want you _both_ out of here." Charlie's voice was firm, but his eyes blazed and Jacob could clearly read disappointment there. He felt a twinge of regret, but it was too quickly lost to a fresh flood of anger. What right did Charlie have to stand in her doorway like that, blocking him from her? What right did Cullen have to be sitting in the waiting room, acting as if he'd never left? What right did _any_ of them have?

"I won't have the two of you going on like this while Bella's dying not twenty yard away." His words hit their mark, and both boys fixed their eyes on the floor. "Jake…get out, cool off, and come back when you can keep it together. Go for a run or something. Edward, you can just go straight to hell. That's all."

Jacob felt vindicated, but knew enough to keep quiet. The two nodded in unison and, matching each other step for excruciatingly slow step, made their way to the elevator that Embry had called for them. Grudgingly, each stepped in on either side of the smaller boy, and Embry himself fidgeted uncomfortably in their almost palpable fury.

The silence persevered until they were outside and safely out of earshot. Embry opened his mouth as if to say something, but kept silent and fled into the woods at a furious glance from Jake. "What the hell are you doing here?"

"I've spent the past seven months thinking that she was alive and well, Jacob, and yesterday I learned that she's been comatose for a month. I don't think you can fully understand how I feel right now, so I would suggest that you get out of my way."

"Yeah, well I've spent the past seven months _wishing_ you were dead. You can see her over my dead body."

"Try me."

"You have _no_ idea."

Their eyes met, locking them into a showdown that was too intimate, too one sided, as Jacob felt the now familiar violation of having his thoughts tapped.

"Let's just clear some things up right now, Jacob. You know what I am, and I know what you are."

Jacob balked.

"Don't look so shocked. You may have gotten better—much better, actually—at guarding your mind, but I have been around long enough to learn how to put two and two together. Alice hasn't been able to see Bella for months; I specifically asked her to stop looking. She doesn't have complete control over what she sees, but she _does_ have limited power over what she wishes to see. She complied, of course."

"Of _ course," _Jacob muttered, mocking Edward's condescending tone. He was ignored.

"What she saw yesterday, however, came entirely of its own accord. Bella—my Bella—lying immobile in a hospital bed, tubes running in and out of her, looking…" He closed his eyes in what seemed to Jacob to be an incredible imitation of pain. Edward regained his composure quickly, though, and cleared his throat. "Looking quite poorly."

"Why would your bloodsucker psychic only have seen her _yesterday_ if such a _tragic_ image could fight its way through her defense?"

His voice dripped disdain, but he did nothing to hide it. There was no Charlie around to scold him now. Edward, despite the malice, responded calmly. "I wondered the same thing, believe me. I questioned it the entire way here, and came to no answer until Charlie so kindly supplied me with it.

"In the midst of his…_colourful_ talk with me early this morning, he mentioned, as you have several times now, that you have been here for her consistently, particularly in sharp contrast to my absence. "

"How is that an answer?"

"Let me finish, please." His eyes flashed, and Jacob fell silent more out of curiosity than respect. "It wasn't until he mentioned that you and your—friends—had been here quite literally around the clock that the pieces came together for me. I know your folklore, Jacob, just as thoroughly as you know mine. We are the cold ones, and in your natural defense, you are the wolves. Your kind doesn't quite match up to us in the way of offense and defense—"

"I could _tear you apart, _bloodsucker, just—"

"—but you _do_ have the ability to blind us. Those of us who can See, like Alice, would find themselves unable to See anyone in the direct presence of a werewolf. As Bella has been for the past month."

Jacob nodded, and for once found himself with nothing to say. There was a strange stillness between them as he processed the information, delighting silently in the strange power he had over his natural enemy. The mental was a completely different battlefield than the physical, one where the cold ones had always trumped them. Until, Jacob was realizing, now. He had unwittingly kept Edward away from Bella, and he felt a certain pride at that. He waited for Edward to say more, but no more came, and the stillness continued.

He wasn't holding onto any kind of pretense, Jacob noticed. He wasn't shifting, wasn't fidgeting, and wasn't playing at breathing in or out. Edward was standing before him as pure as he would ever be. He was in a completely natural vampiric state, staring him down in a hospital parking lot, so full of fear for his love and remorse for his stupidity that he had forgotten the very actions that allowed his kind to blend in. He was as still as a sculpture.

He was as still as death, and it made Jacob sick.

"You did this to her, you know."

"I know."

"It's your fault that she jumped. It's your fault that she's in there. It's your fault that I haven't heard her voice in a _month._"

"I know all that."

"Good."

The silence fell again, almost glowing between them as the sun fought against the clouds. Edward didn't seem worried about the approaching sun, however. He didn't seem to feel _anything _as he stood stock still, staring not at Jacob but rather at something directly over Jacob's left shoulder. He looked as though he were in a trance.

"Why don't you just go home, bloodsucker?" Jacob saw it as his duty to break the silence, though he was not particularly concerned with anything else Edward might have to say. He wanted it over because of the emptiness in Edward's eyes, the blank slate of his features that reminded Jacob far too much of Bella, of the way she sometimes looked when she thought he wasn't looking. He was afraid, because he knew that he was seeing the counterpart of that expression, the other half of the whole that could have kept her off of the cliff that day. He was afraid that he would confess his inability to be enough for her, that his lips would take some of the blame that he was all too ready to heap solely upon Edward.

The worst part was that he knew Edward heard all of it. But words stolen were not words spoken, and Jacob could live with that. So he broke the silence.

"Why don't you just wipe that stupid look off of your face and leave like you did before, okay? Because I really can't stomach much more of this."

Just then, a screaming child grabbed onto the sleeve of Edward's shirt. He couldn't have been more than a year old, carried by his mother into the hospital, or into hell, depending on whose point of view you saw it through. The woman jerked her son's hand away quickly with a muttered apology, but the brief interruption was enough to bring Edward back from _wherever_ he'd gone.

And he was _really_ back, lips pinched, eyes burning, chest rising and falling falsely once more. "I will stay until Charlie allows me to see her."

Jacob smirked. "I'd suggest making yourself comfortable, then."


	3. Chapter 3

"What do you _mean_ he's in there with her?" Charlie's head shot up, along with the heads of those at the tables all around him. The cafeteria was crowded, and Jacob was _loud._

"Jeeze, Jake, you just can't learn the meaning of 'shuddup,' can you?"

"He _left_ her, Charlie! He's the whole reason she's in there!"

"You don't need to tell me that, Jake." Charlie rubbed his eyes, weary of the argument he'd so obviously been through with himself once or twice already. "I know it. I lived with her those first few months, remember? Before you came along and helped her. I remember what it was like when he left, with all the screaming and the staring and the silence. But she loved him, Jake. I may not like to admit it, but that's because I'm her father. Any idiot can see that she loved him." Jake cringed, but said nothing. "Just leave him be for a little while, okay? Then I'll kick him out and you can go back to hating him. Just leave him be for a minute or two."

Jacob sighed, pulling a chair out for himself at the small table Charlie was currently burdening with the largest cup of coffee Jacob had ever seen. "Fine," he conceded. "But I don't like it, Charlie. I _really_ don't like it."

"And you think I do?" Charlie rubbed his eyes again, a tic that was becoming more and more familiar of him. "She always hated when I was mean to him. Or _about_ him. This is for her, Jake. She'd want me to be nice, I think. She's so damn much like her mother when she gets something like that into her head." Jacob wasn't convinced, and Charlie could tell. Meeting the boy's eyes, his tone turned serious.

"It's just in and out, Jacob. He goes in, gets whatever guilt's on his conscience back off it, cries a little if he's got any heart in him, and then leaves. That's it. I'll make sure of it. He'll get what he wants, I'll feel good about myself as a father, and Bella's none the worse off for it. She'll never even know he was here."

Charlie's voice was so reassuring, so certain, that Jacob almost agreed. He almost nodded his head, patted the Charlie on the back, grabbed himself a cup and sat back to wait it out like a trooper. In that moment, Jacob was ready to do right by Charlie, by Bella, and, God help him, even by Edward.

That was, until the nurse came running in. Until, out of breath, she skidded to a stop at their table and told them, "She's back. Charlie, Jacob, your girl is back."

Jacob looked at Charlie, eyes wide, incredulous. "She's…"

Charlie only nodded. "Come on, Jake. I know she's going to want to see you."

"Charlie, she's…and _Cullen…_"

"I know, Jake." His eyes flashed, all drowsiness long gone. "Let's go."

They were in her room in a flash, Charlie turning to speak to the nurse and Jacob barreling past them. She was propped up against her stiff, hospital regulation pillows, looking paler and tinier than ever. Her hand was held tightly in Edward's, and her tears were steady. Her lips moved, but at first Jacob couldn't hear the words. Truthfully, he didn't care what they were. The fact that she was speaking at all was enough for him.

"Bells. Honey, you're awake. You're awake."

She looked up at him happily, and her smile was nearly enough to kill him. "Edward's back, Jake! Edward came back!"

His heart sank, and he willed himself to be strong. He willed himself not to run screaming from the room, and he willed himself not to tear Edward's head off with his bare hands. Not while they were still in the hospital, anyway. "Edward was just leaving, Bella." Her eyes grew wide, and Edward shot him a look of pure ice.

"I'm not going _anywhere,_" he assured her, but his eyes never left Jacob's. "I'm staying right here."

"Right now," the nurse said, breaking the tension, "I need you all to give her some space. We've got a lot of tests that need to be done, and her doctor needs to look at her _now._ So unless you've got a gun in your holster, _scoot._" Charlie patted the gun at his waist and smiled sheepishly at the boys.

"How 'bout letting me spend some time with my daughter? I still get to love her first, you know. You boys are just going to have to duke it out over second and third." With that, the nurse drew the curtain around Bella, Charlie and herself, leaving the boys standing in the doorway, staring at the girl they loved, left with nothing but each other.


End file.
